Sins of the Fathers (25 page)

‘Like what?'

‘Doesn't like me smoking in the house. Says it makes the place smell. Can you believe it?'

‘It is a little unusual,' Rutter admitted.

‘But be that as it may, one of the first things you're taught as a young officer is that you should never become involved in a battle that you know you can't possibly win, and if there was ever a perfect example of that dictum, this is it. So if the memsahib wishes to enforce a policy of no smoking in quarters, that's the way it has to be.'

‘Quite,' Rutter said.

‘And it's not such a high price to pay, considering that the woman's allowed herself to be dragged halfway around the world and back over the last thirty or so years,' Colonel Thompson said.

‘So you came out into the garden for the purpose of having a smoke?!' Rutter said.

‘Took you long enough to get there, didn't it?' Colonel Thompson said. ‘Lucky you weren't facing wild tribesmen, or you'd have been dead by now. Anyway, the point is, I
did
come out into the garden, and that's when I noticed the car parked on the street in front of the Hawtrey residence.'

‘Was there anybody in it?'

‘I'll tell this in my own way, if you don't mind,' Colonel Thompson said sharply.

‘Go ahead,' Rutter agreed.

‘There was nobody there at first. Then a chap appeared out of the driveway. Can't give you much of a description, I'm afraid. In the fog, he was little more than a black shape. At any rate, he opened the boot of the car and—'

‘You're sure he opened the boot?'

‘Of course I'm sure. Wouldn't have said it if I hadn't been. He opened the boot, then he disappeared up the driveway again. And at that point, I must admit, I wandered off to the other side of the garden.'

‘So you didn't see any more?'

‘If you can stop interrupting for a moment, I'll tell you what I saw and what I didn't see.'

‘Sorry,' Rutter said.

‘By the time I returned to my original vantage point, the man had reappeared from the driveway, and this time he was holding another man up. I assumed the second man was drunk, but from what I've read in the papers, the other man was probably Pine – and he was dead.'

‘That's more than likely,' Rutter agreed.

‘The murderer … we are agreed that it was probably the murderer, are we?'

‘We're agreed.'

‘The murderer opened the back door of the car, and bundled Pine into it. He had a certain amount of difficulty doing it, but no more than he'd have had if Pine been dead drunk instead of simply dead.'

‘Can I ask a question now?' Rutter said.

‘Yes,
now
you may,' the Colonel conceded.

‘Did it, at any point, look as if he might be thinking of putting Pine in the boot?'

‘No, it didn't – though the boot was still open.'

‘So what happened next?'

‘Once he'd crammed Pine into the car, he slammed the door closed. It made quite a noise in the still night air, and I remember thinking that I hoped the poor drunk was well tucked inside the car, because if his arm had been hanging out, the force would have broken it.'

‘What did the murderer do next?' Rutter asked. ‘Did he get into the driver's seat?'

‘No, he didn't. The boot was still open, remember.' Colonel Thompson paused for a moment. ‘That wasn't some kind of test you were putting me to, was it?' he continued.

‘A test?'

‘To try and establish whether or not I'm gaga?'

‘Of course not,' Rutter replied, hoping that he wasn't blushing.

‘The killer went round to the back of the car, and closed the boot. And this time, he was much more careful about it. I thought at the time it was because he was showing some belated consideration for the residents.'

‘But you don't think that now?'

‘Chap who's just smashed another chap's head in isn't going to worry about causing offence to the local rate-payers, now is he?'

‘So why
did
he close the boot so carefully?'

‘I haven't the foggiest idea.' Colonel Thompson chuckled. ‘That was rather good, wasn't it? It was foggy, and I haven't the foggiest idea.'

‘Very droll,' Rutter agreed. ‘I'll be sending a man round to take down your statement later, sir. That should be no problem, should it?'

‘No problem at all,' Colonel Thompson agreed. ‘I'll do my duty, as I always have.'

D
r Shastri entered Woodend's office without knocking. For once there was nothing in her movements to suggest the gentle gliding of a butterfly. In fact, she came much closer to resembling an enraged wasp.

‘In case you wish to keep a record of it for posterity, I should inform you that your little deception was effective for exactly one hour, thirty-five minutes and twenty-eight seconds, Chief Inspector,' she said.

‘I beg your pardon?' Woodend replied.

‘That is precisely how long it took me to discover I have been wasting my time. For a moment, it seemed to me just like a return to the bad old days, and I was very angry indeed.'

‘The bad old days?' Woodend repeated, completely mystified. ‘What bad old days?'

‘The bad old days when I first came to this country of yours.'

‘You're not makin' a lot of sense, lass.'

‘Then I will explain further. Many of the English people with whom I worked at that time thought it might be most amusing to hold me up to ridicule. And so they talked in my presence about diseases I had never heard of – which is hardly surprising, since they had just invented them – and they sent me off on countless pointless errands. Nor did it stop there. They hid medical records from me, and sent me friends of theirs who claimed to be suffering terrible symptoms, but were only really
pretending
to be ill.'

‘Why did they do that?'

‘Because they considered it great sport to confuse the poor, unsophisticated Indian doctor – to make a complete monkey out of her, in fact. And it seemed to me that you were doing exactly the same thing yourself.'

‘Come off it, Doc,' Woodend protested. ‘First of all, if one of us is unsophisticated, it certainly isn't you. An' secondly – an' more importantly – I've got too much respect for you to try an' make you look a fool.'

Dr Shastri nodded. ‘Yes, that is the conclusion I had already almost reached myself, and I am pleased to have you confirm it,' she said. ‘So I am no longer angry. You are far too nice a man to ever deliberately insult me, so if it is not an insult it must be an example of your strange English sense of humour, which you expected me to share. Very well, then, I must learn to develop this strange sense of humour, too, and when the opportunity arises, I will play a similar joke on you.'

‘I still don't have the slightest idea of what you're talkin' about, Doc,' Woodend confessed.

‘Of course you don't,' Dr Shastri replied, smiling knowingly. ‘Would you care to hear what is in the autopsy report?'

She might
say
she wasn't angry any more, Woodend thought, but anger was still there, bubbling just below the surface.

‘Yes, I'd like to hear what it,' he told her. ‘An' I must say, you've got hold of it very quickly.'

‘Indeed I have. But then, you always knew that I would, didn't you, Chief Inspector?'

‘Did I? How?'

‘Very good,' Dr Shastri said. ‘Very nicely played. You kept your face perfectly straight, and you
almost
convince me that you had no idea what I was talking about. But to return to the report – Mr Alec Hawtrey broke his leg when he was climbing. He sustained no other injuries, but the broken leg alone was enough to make him less resilient than his companions in the face of the blizzard, and he died of exposure.'

‘You still haven't told me how you managed to get hold of the report so quickly?' Woodend pointed out.

‘I called my colleague in Cumberland, and reminded him of the jolly times we had spent together at medical conferences, playing “Pass the Vital Organ” and “Pin the Appendix on the Cadaver”,' Dr Shastri said, regaining some of her normal good humour. ‘Once I had him eating out of my hand, I asked him if he wouldn't mind sending me the autopsy report. He said that wasn't necessary, because we already had a copy of it.'

‘What?'

‘He did not perform the autopsy himself, you see. He was
intending
to perform it, but then a Police Superintendent, by the name of Springer, informed him that it would instead be carried out by another medical examiner from outside the county.'

‘Isn't that unusual?' Woodend asked.

‘Very unusual indeed. But Superintendent Springer told him that the decision had been taken at the
highest levels
of the police authority, so he saw no point in arguing.'

‘An' who
was
this medical examiner from outside the county, who actually did the job?'

Dr Shastri smiled again. ‘So you continue with your little joke right through to the bitter end,' she said. ‘I must make a note of that, so that when you become the victim of my revenge-joke on you, I can sustain it with equal ferocity.'

‘I honestly don't know who he was,' Woodend said.

‘If it pleases you so much, I can see no harm in going along with your game,' Dr Shastri said. She put her hand to her forehead, as if thinking very hard. ‘Who
could
it be?' she continued. ‘If the death occurred in Cumberland, why would we have a copy of the autopsy report here in Whitebridge?'

‘Because the medical examiner who carried out the autopsy was from Whitebridge himself?' Woodend asked, finally grasping the point.

‘Exactly! It was my predecessor who actually performed the autopsy – Dr Pierson.'

Doc Pierson! Woodend repeated to himself.

The last case that he and Pierson had worked on together had been the murder at Dugdale's Farm. And Pierson really
had
made a monkey out of
him
, because in order to conceal a whole stinking level of municipal corruption, he had deliberately distorted the medical evidence – and almost allowed the killer to escape.

The doctor was still serving time in HM Prison Saltney for that particular betrayal of his Hippocratic oath. But who could say how many more times before then he had fudged the evidence, in order to protect some rich or powerful member of the Whitebridge élite?

And given that Bradley Pine had been both rich
and
powerful, was the autopsy report really worth the paper it was printed on?

Constable Colin Beresford did not feel entirely comfortable about entering a Catholic church, and there was ample reason for this. When he had to fill in any forms which asked about his religion, he always wrote down ‘Church of England', but his church-going was largely confined to christenings, weddings and funerals, and if he thought about God at all, it was only to wonder why He had chosen to inflict a mind-decaying disease on a woman who was still in her early sixties.

Still, once he was actually inside St Mary's, he could not help but be fascinated by what he saw. The place might not be holier than any of the churches he was used to, but it was certainly much more elaborate.

Looking around at the statues and paintings, smelling the incense which lingered in the air from the last service, he got the distinct impression that this was a religion which took itself very seriously indeed.

The priest's appearance came as something of a surprise, too. All the vicars who Beresford had come across had been old men – in their fifties, at least – but this man couldn't be more than thirty.

‘Can I help you?' the priest asked.

‘I'm looking for someone,' Beresford said.

The priest smiled. ‘And is that someone God?' he asked. ‘Because if He is who you're looking for, you've come to the right place.'

‘No, I'm … I'm looking for a police officer,' Beresford said, starting to feel a little confused.

‘Then might I suggest you would be likely to be more successful if you began your search at a police station?'

‘This officer – this
female
officer – is working on a case at the moment, and I thought she might be here.'

‘You're talking about Monika, aren't you?'

‘Yes, that's right. Sergeant Paniatowski.'

‘She's not here,' Father Taylor said. ‘Nor, as far as I know, is she expected in the near future. But if you'd care to leave a message with me, I'll deliver it to her the next time I see her.'

‘No, that's all right,' Beresford said. ‘I should be seeing her myself before too long.'

‘Is what's troubling you something that only Monika can help you with?' the priest asked, with a concerned and sympathetic look on his face. ‘Or might I, possibly, be of some assistance?'

‘No, I'm very sorry, but it really does have to be Sergeant Paniatowski,' Beresford said.

‘There's no need to apologize,' Father Taylor said softly. ‘We all have the right to choose our own guides.'

‘You're very understanding, Father,' Beresford said.

‘I try to be,' the priest replied.

Once outside again, Beresford cleared his head of the slightly intimidating atmosphere of the Catholic Church by greedily sucking in the contaminated air of a Northern industrial town.

The priest had asked him why he had been looking for Sergeant Paniatowski. Well, the answer to that was simple enough.

He was a lost soul – though in an investigative, rather than a religious, sense.

He was a man out of his depth, wondering if he could keep treading water until he learned how to swim, or whether it might not be better to be hauled on to the shore and content himself, henceforth, with wearing a uniform.